


Maybe We Can Be The Garden That The Neighbors Talk About

by Trinidad



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: But also not, Flowers, Language of Flowers, M/M, erm sorry for this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-27
Updated: 2016-03-27
Packaged: 2018-05-29 12:29:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,882
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6374770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trinidad/pseuds/Trinidad
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dan starts to see people as flowers when he was younger.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Maybe We Can Be The Garden That The Neighbors Talk About

**Author's Note:**

> So this is a story about Dan seeing people as flowers. And he meets Phil and yeah.   
> I have the meanings of the flowers that ill put in the end notes, though I would rather have you read them first so you can understand the story better but eh.

I remember the first time I started seeing people as flowers. I was in elementary school and I stayed home that day because I was sick. My parents had to work so I was left alone all day with numerous phone calls coming in every hour checking up on me to see if I was eating and if I were drinking lots of fluids, yes I was drinking lots of fluids. 

 

I remember staying on the couch or my bed for most of the day because I was restless and felt like moving around, even in my condition. But about lunchtime, I was seated in the kitchen on a barstool eating a sandwich my mother had left me. 

 

From there I could see the front lawn of my neighbor, overgrown with red, yellow, and even violet tulips. There were white roses, and red roses, and holly, and hints of lavender spread around the edges. 

 

The neighbor was tearing them all up, uprooting them from the ground, his kid watching from the window, and I saw anemone sprouting from his chest and his hands were full of basil and his mouth had aconite dripping out. But he, himself was a blue bell. 

 

Watching his hands work at ripping up the flowers, I didn't see a ring on his finger anymore and I wondered if he just took it off so as to not get it dirty or for another reason. 

 

The next day when I woke for school, his car was gone and the lawn looked as if there were no flowers there to dig up in the first place. I don't remember seeing him again after that. His kid, who I couldn't make out a flower on his body, either.

 

Now, no matter where I go or who I look at, all I see are flowers where there should be noses or arms or fingers. I see bluets with the people walking down the street, and I see bellwort growing out of the pores on college students faces, and I see bayberry in the hands of soldiers and I see barberry on my father's face as well as american starwort in the old folks’ smile that take sunday walks. 

 

~~

 

I remember the first time I started seeing weeds instead of eyeballs and toes. I was in my last year of middle school and I had met this boy who lived down the street from me but was home schooled. He would ride his bike next to the school bus every afternoon and the kids would always cheer for him to beat it. He never did. I never took part with the cheering. 

 

But one day, it was in the last day of school, and it had started warming up more, and he started riding his bike again. It was friday, and the bus did it's usual cheering for him and I looked over and saw him smile up at me and I felt astilbe bloom in my chest and I ended up cheering for him all the way home until my stop. Where he stopped his bike right outside the bus door waiting for me, like we had a secret together. I invited him over for dinner that night.

 

We were in my room that night, a tangle of limbs and apricot blossoms, and there were bridal roses in our eyes and calidum in our gasps and I swore I heard arbutus when he said my name. The next day, he was gone and I don't think I saw him again after that. 

 

Now that I think about it, the apricot blossoms I thought I felt were actually catchfly and red columbine, the bridal roses were not bridal roses but clematis, and the gasping calidum was really bilberry in disguise. 

 

I used to hear that arbutus every night after he left, but now all I hear is black black black. Because I didn't know what I was hearing. I know now that I heard a weed in his voice. He was saying my name, but all I heard was nimblewill. 

 

I looked at myself in the mirror the night after, and I didn't recognize me anymore. Where I used to see aster and daisies and gladiolus, I saw dandelions on my cheeks and prostrate spurge crawling up my arms and legs and there were wild violets clawing their way out of my chest and I tried to rip them all off of me to see the aster and the daisies and the gladiolus but they just kept growing and growing and growing so I stopped. 

 

That's what weeds do right? The more you pick at them, the harder they become to control or get rid of. 

 

~~

 

As time went on, I started seeing weeds in people's voices but not on their bodies. Only on mine. 

 

I didn't see the indian strawberry on the hooker walking down a black alley last night, I only saw black mulberry in her eyes and bay wreath on her chest. The guy who took my seat on the subway didn't have ground ivy for ears but basil & barberry instead. My mom, who yelled at me for dropping out of college didn't have white clovers dripping off her tongue but betony and carolina syringa, with a hint of black mulberry. Though her voice was hard to tear out of my ears that night because knotweeds are hard to get rid of.

 

~~

 

I remember the day I first saw a weed on a person other than me. I was getting on the subway to head over to my friends house when I saw a guy sitting down by the door, he was wearing the same shirt as me, an old Pokemon shirt with the logo faded & he looked oddly familiar. He must have noticed me staring, because he looked up and smiled at me and I saw the annual bluegrass that was sprouting from his lips curl back to reveal teeth as white as calla lily & lips pinker than a carnation. He was beautiful.

 

I sat next to him the entire ride, which was about 30 minutes and I felt his carpetweed wrap around my waist and crawl up my chest to latch around my throat and disrupt my breathing because he smelled of geranium and hyacinth. 

 

The next time I saw him, I was at the public library. I just recently started working there, it's a pretty good job all in all until you see the boy you met a week and a half ago that made you swallow carpetweed and see carnations. 

 

“Hey, it's you!” He says, bounding up to me. His voice sounded a lot like larkspur, and oh my Clark Gable I didn't notice his eyes the last time we met. They were nothing like the hydrangeas in my mother’s garden but like the blue iris I see in my dreams. They may look like blue iris but they oozed speedwell and that made them all the more beautiful.

 

“And it's you?” I said, remembering we didn't share a single word together that day. “Oh sorry, sorry. My names Phil, Phil Lester. Nice to meet you.”

 

He held out his hand and it was covered in henbit but it reminded me of jasmine, and I felt the carpetweed crawl into my throat again as I took his hand and shook it. I saw lilac.

 

With the carpetweed in my throat it was hard to choke out “Daniel Howell, but everyone just calls me Dan. Nice to meet you too”

 

From there on, we tangled our weeds together to become a blue periwinkle. 

 

~~

 

A few years passed and we started living together and I didn't think I could be happier.

 

~~

 

I remember the first time I told someone I could see flowers on people and weeds in their voices. Phil and I were laying on the couch after a day of friends and birthday cake when a commercial on the t.v. announcing a sale on flowers down at the local flower shop came on, and for some reason I started seeing coral rose and I just had to tell him. I've never told anyone before so I didn't know how he would react, but it wasn't like this.

 

Before I tell you that I should also tell you that Phil is the only one I have ever seen a weed on. He doesn't speak in weeds, doesn't tread on weeds but he himself is covered in them, his soul is made up of flowers and that's why they color him instead of become him.

 

Also, about a year ago I began to hear acacia when he talked and every time I looked at him I could feel where the blue violet should have bloomed if I grew flowers anymore.

 

So the night I told him, I wasn't expecting to see bridal rose come out of his mouth in reply and when he asked me what he looked like and I told him he's the only one i've ever seen as a weed besides myself I didn't expect for him to scoot closer and when he asked what his voice looked like I didn't expect him to crash his mouth into mine when I told him it sounded like baby’s breath and austrian rose. 

 

His mouth didn't taste like the carnation that were made up his lips but the coffee he drank earlier and his tongue didn't feel like the carpet weed he's been gaging me with for the past few years, but like the soft petals that I see on strangers. 

 

His hands on my chest didn't feel like henbit and it no longer reminded me of jasmine but balsam, like he's been wanting to tangle his henbit into my infertile soil and dig until the blue violet i've been hiding bloomed and I became a flower again. 

 

We became african marigold after that and I told him he was a blue camellia now and he said my name over and over but all I could hear was arbutus, and this time it felt true.

 

~~

 

I remember the last time I saw people as flowers and voices as weeds. That day, Phil had to run a couple of errands around town. Said it would take too long for me to tag along and that I should stay home, he said that when he came back we would go to that new restaurant that opened up 2 blocks down the street. I said ok, blinded by the dwarf sunflower dropping from each word.

 

About 2 hours later, I got a phone call that was all dead leaves and cypress. 

 

I don't remember tearing mallow off my face the next week, or cutting the prostrate spurge off of my torso. My body was blank and the tunnel of blue violets where my heart was was blank, there wasn't even a trace left behind to show that anything grew there at all.

 

I am 25 now, and a year ago I lost my best friend and love of my life to a dead driver that I never got to scream at. Everyday now, I walk down to the cemetery where Phil is burried and leave him dark pink roses.

 

There will never be enough dark pink roses.

 

Never.

**Author's Note:**

> The flowers and weeds are put in the order they appear in the story.
> 
> Flowers--
> 
> Red Tulip- Declaration of love.
> 
> Yellow Tulip- Hopelessly in love.
> 
> Violet Tulip- Faithfulness
> 
> White rose- Purity
> 
> Red Rose-Passionate love.
> 
> Holly- Domestic happiness
> 
> Lavender- Distrust
> 
> Anemone- Refusal, Abandonment, Forsaken, Estrangement, Expectation, Loneliness, Fading hope, Sickness
> 
> Basil- Hatred
> 
> Aconite- Poisonous Words, Lustre, Misanthropy
> 
> Blue Bell- Delicacy, Humility, Loyalty, Humility, Constancy, Sorrow, Regret
> 
> Bluets- Contentment
> 
> Bellwort- Hopelessness
> 
> Bayberry- Discipline
> 
> Barberry- Sharp Temper
> 
> American Starwort- Cheerfulness in old age
> 
> Apricot Blossoms- Timid Love
> 
> Bridal Rose- Happy love
> 
> Calidum- Joy, delight
> 
> Arbutus- I love only you
> 
> Catchfly- Pretended love
> 
> Red Columbine- Worried, trembling, anxious
> 
> Clematis- Artificial, not genuine
> 
> Bilberry- Treachery 
> 
> Aster- Daintiness, Love, Variety, Diversity
> 
> Daisies- Innocence, purity
> 
> Gladiolus- Strength of character
> 
> Black Mulberry- Sadness
> 
> Bay Wreath- Reward for merit
> 
> Betony- Surprise
> 
> Carolina Syringa- Disappointment
> 
> Calla Lily- Majestic Beauty, Modesty
> 
> Carnation- Pride, beauty
> 
> Geranium- Comfort
> 
> Hyacinth- Sincerity
> 
> Larkspur- Beautiful spirit
> 
> Hydrangeas-Heartfelt emotions 
> 
> Blue Iris- Faith, hope
> 
> Jasmine- Grace, elegance
> 
> Lilac- First Love
> 
> Blue Periwinkle- New Friendship
> 
> Coral Rose- Desire
> 
> Acacia- Platonic Love, Concealed love, Secret Love, Friendship, Chaste Love
> 
> Babys Breath- Happiness
> 
> Austrian Rose- Lovely
> 
> Balsam- Impatience, Ardent love
> 
> African Marigold- Vulgar minded
> 
> Blue Camilla- You are a flame in my heart
> 
> Dwarf Sunflower- Adoration
> 
> Dead Leaves- Sadness
> 
> Cypress- Despair, Mourning, Hopeless Deceit, Vanity, Regard, Melancholy, Death
> 
> Dark Pink Rose- Thank you.
> 
>  
> 
> Weeds--
> 
> Nimblewill- https://extension.umd.edu/hgic/nimblewill
> 
> Dandelions- https://extension.umd.edu/hgic/dandelion
> 
> Prostrate Spurge- https://extension.umd.edu/hgic/prostrate-spurge
> 
> Wild Violets- https://extension.umd.edu/hgic/wild-violet
> 
> Indian Strawberry- https://extension.umd.edu/hgic/indian-mock-strawberry
> 
> Ground Ivy- https://extension.umd.edu/hgic/ground-ivy
> 
> White Colvers- https://extension.umd.edu/hgic/clover
> 
> Knotweed- https://extension.umd.edu/hgic/knotweed
> 
> Annual Bluegrass- https://extension.umd.edu/hgic/annual-bluegrass
> 
> Carpetweed- https://extension.umd.edu/hgic/carpetweed
> 
> Speedwell- https://extension.umd.edu/hgic/speedwell
> 
> Henbit- http://extension.umd.edu/hgic/henbit
> 
> Mallow- https://extension.umd.edu/hgic/common-mallow
> 
>  
> 
> That's it and I hope you enjoyed!


End file.
